All Fashion Lady

Shanghai-raised designer running her own label in London tells Denise Marray she admires Westwood and Hepburn for their independent streak, and credits the London School of Fashion for making her a 'pattern engineer'


Shanghai-raised Jenny Sun, of London-based label By Sun, talks about being inspired by British fashion designer Vivienne Westwood and actress Katharine Hepburn.


Jenny Sun


What made you want to work in fashion? "Both of my parents were involved in business, and I really sought to learn from that. However, my inclination veered towards creating rather than the logistics of business itself.


"My mother encouraged my creative side and would give me old clothes to repurpose. I spent high school turning old clothes into something new and interesting. Fashion just seemed like a natural career path for me."


Why did you choose Hollywood star Katharine Hepburn as muse for your autumn-winter 2016 collection? "She was the first woman to wear trousers in Hollywood, at a time when they were widely regarded as being 'unladylike'. This showed her spirit of independence and ability to stand apart from the crowd. The '40s era has inspired the whole collection. In that decade the shapes were quite classic. You can see that girls' school uniforms of the era have influenced my designs. We have tried to balance the masculine silhouette with feminine textiles."





Which designer do you most admire? "Vivienne Westwood. To this day her clothes are characteristically Westwood and she remains committed to her unique style, which is admirable for a brand that has been running for decades. Just as important is her sense of charity and her continual campaigning for the environment."





Your garments are beautifully made with great attention to detail. What motivates you to be so passionate? "Learning how to make and design a pattern was an important element of my fashion design technology course at London College of Fashion. It's like learning to be a pattern engineer. I think clothes should feel wonderful on the body. So, for example, I pay a lot of attention to really fine, luxury linings."

There's something about musicians getting their hands on high-street fashion, perhaps it’s a winning formula for the brand and the pop star. Take for example Rita Ora for Adidas, Rihanna for River Island, or the likes of Gwen Stefani, Adam Levine, Jessica Simpson, Kanye West and Madonna owning their own clothing brand.









London-based pop star Jess Glynne is the latest musician to work in a fashion collaboration with young British label Bench. She launched a spring/summer 2016 capsule collection of black silhouettes, electric blues and metallic gold - including a batwing bomber, signature all-over print turquoise crop top and a slinky jumpsuit. It’s very streetwear, as you’d expect from her on-stage attires and her signature ginger threads.









The collaboration follows her first work for the urban label as the face of its autumn 2015 collection, which was part of Bench’s #LoveMyHood campaign. It has seen musicians from around the world contribute to their local neighbourhood. In the video campaign, 26-year-old Glynne praises North London, while she gives fans an exclusive peek to her personal life visits Alexandra Place, her West London studio and Soho.


“I grew up next to Alexandra Palace which is such an iconic place. If someone had said to me then “Oi jess, you’re going to be playing there 10 years later” I think I would have laughed in their face. I’m sitting here now having just played there, and I think it was probably one of the most memorable gigs I have ever played,” says the Grammy-award winning singer.









Following the success of her collaborations like Rather Be feat with Clean Bandit, she also praises working with other artists. “One of the best things about making music is getting to collaborate with other artists. London is home to so many amazing artists - it’s the right place to be right now.

The Spring/Summer 2016 fashion collections are currently in store, just in time for a wardrobe update. What’s noticeable is a lot of easy movement, from the long dresses and slinky sleepwear, and attention to detail as seen from textures and patterns.


It’s also the season to lose your pants, with jackets turning into dresses. Here’s a look at some of the key trends.


Flowy maxi dresses is the ultimate in chic for spring. Wear it long and loose or cinched for shape in a look that takes you seamlessly from day to night.


Salvatore Ferragamo’s off shoulder maxi gives the dress a playful flair while Tory Burch pops with a bright yellow crocheted kaftan that drapes comfortably over the body.


Layering clothes may not be something new but what is trending right now are the colours and textures used for layering. With spring’s lighter fabrics, the look remains cool and comfortable for the weather.


At Chanel, a midi length dress is layered over a pink taffeta wide legged trousers and worn with a signature tweed jacket. Marni takes on colours and textures with three layers of tops starting with a grey one to green and finally brown.


Ruffles by Dries Van Noten.

Pleats by Michael Kors.

Maxi dress by Ferragamo.

Balenciaga


Pleats and ruffles return to the runway and in a big way ranging from head-to-toe looks or as clever detailing. Dries Van Noten goes sheer with ruffles giving it a nonchalant chic and grungy vibe instead.


Michael Kors turned it up a notch by adding eyelets at the end of each pleat, giving it an added depth. Lingerie and pajama style looks have been entering into dailywear recently. It has even earned the nickname “sleepcorp” combining the words sleepwear and corporate. While it may not always be considered suitable attire for work, if you know how to style it, it can be pulled off.


The silky satin finish of negligee is seen throughout Balenciaga’s collection. Sexy and slinky with bows, lace and ruffles, this look may only be appropriate for cocktail parties unless you throw on a severe or structured jacket for day.


Clavin Klein stays safe with its matching separates that combines “midnight milk run” with a cool nonchalance. Men’s style clothing has invaded womenswear the last couple of seasons in terms of the pantsuit. For spring, the look has evolved with the suit jacket being a focal point.


Fendi’s blue fitted cutout suit jacket with leather weaving has a cool and chic vibe. Acne turns the suit jacket into a dress, another look seen in several collections.


Acne

Calvin Klein

Fendi

Taylor Swift’s tumultuous love life often made her music take a backseat, but that happened only until she learned to bank on it. In a new video posted online, she details the romance that inspired her hit song “Out of the Woods,” which is widely believed to be about Harry Styles.

The two dated for only a few months, but their celebrity status turned the relationship into tabloid fodder from the instant they went public. The song in question was written shortly after the split, so while Taylor never named Harry as her source of inspiration, the Internet has long decided that she could only be singing about him on it.

“The number one feeling I felt in the whole relationship was anxiety”

Because she knows that people will speculate even more if she talks about the inspiration behind some of her songs, Taylor doesn’t do it that often. When she does, though, she makes sure it has been worth the wait, like it happened with this acoustic rendering of “Out of the Woods” that she performed at the Grammy Museum.

Introducing the song, she says that the doomed relationship that inspired it was one where her number one feeling was of anxiety.

“Because it felt very fragile, it felt very tentative,” she says. “And it always felt like, ‘Okay, what's the next road block? What's the next thing that's gonna deter this? How long do we have before this turns into just an awful mess and we break up? Is it a month? Is it three days?’”

Still, she adds, the romance was a beautiful thing precisely because it was so fragile. She doesn’t regret it so she’s not trying to make the song into a diss track; it’s merely a representation of the feelings she felt during her time with that boy.

Take it with a grain of salt

Whenever she’s pressed into revealing who some of her songs are about, Taylor always refuses to do that: she’s not in the habit of making music as a way of getting even, but as an artist, she will draw for inspiration on real life.

At the same time, she encourages more rumors with statements like the one in the video below, which leave no room for doubt that the song was written about a real boy who really broke her heart.

In the end, it’s all business for Taylor. Drama generates headlines and media attention translates into bigger sales. Even when she’s protesting against it, she’s still feeding it, because it serves her interests.

When there’s no drama to be had, artists are known to create it just to get press. In other words, all statements like the one Taylor makes about “Out of the Woods” should be taken with a grain of salt.

Angelina Julie and Brad Pitt first worked together on the action thriller “Mr. and Mrs. Smith,” on whose set they also became romantically involved. Until this year, they refused to do another movie together out of fear that their tabloid persona would overshadow it, but that’s about to change with “By the Sea.”

“By the Sea” is the story of a married couple dealing with loss, on the verge of coming apart. It will be out on November 13 in the hope of qualifying for the awards season, and was - strangely enough - shot during what should have been Angelina and Brad’s honeymoon.

“I trust her with my life”

In addition to starring Hollywood’s most powerful couple as a couple, “By the Sea” also got plenty of media attention for being directed by Angelina, off a script she wrote. This is Angelina’s passion project, and Brad is only along for the ride, helping her tell her story, he says in a new interview for V Magazine.

You can see some gorgeous portraits of Brad channeling Robert Redford, from the V Mag spread, in the gallery below.

“It’s surprising how much I enjoy the direction of my wife,” Brad explains. “She’s decisive, incredibly intuitive, knife-sharp, and might I say, sexy at her post. I trust her with my life. The plan was to make something together, with complete autonomy. […] We, by our own admission, were overdue. If I’m going to work, I want to work with my wife.”

He admits that shooting a drama about a failed marriage isn’t the ideal way to spend a honeymoon, but he chooses to look at the silver lining: marriage is about working together towards a common goal, and that’s exactly what they did when they shot this movie.

He also says that he didn’t want to let Angelina down by not being able to bring her words to life in front of the camera, and jokes that the role was a perfect fit for him: he plays a drunk because he has plenty of experience as one.

Early Oscar buzz

“By the Sea” won’t get a wide release as a major studio film would, which means that the media buzz around it will also be moderate. This is a movie made for the awards season, so all promotion will serve the purpose of bringing it to the attention of the critics, not the wide audience.

You can see a first trailer embedded below.

Even though it’s still early, the film is already getting some Oscar buzz, in the sense that people are saying this might be Jolie’s shot at a Best Director nomination in the upcoming Oscar race. Then again, people said the same about her “Unbroken” last year, and nothing came out of all that talk.

That didn’t take long: hours after she filed for divorce from Olivier Martinez, and he filed his own petition looking to annul hers, Halle Berry filed once more, this time using their real names. She’s also started trashing her future ex in the press.

People Magazine, a publication that’s always been camp Berry, offers an inside look at what promises to be a very bitter divorce battle, perhaps even more bitter than the custody war Halle waged against her other ex, model Gabriel Aubry.

Martinez was violent, easily intimidated

The narrative that’s starting to shape up is that, though married for only 2 years, Halle became convinced early on in the marriage that they weren’t a good fit. The blame is all Martinez’s, because he couldn’t handle with a woman who was stronger, more powerful and more influential than he was.

Making matters even worse is the fact that he was also unpredictable and violent, and had a temper that he could simply not control.

“Oliver comes from a world where he was easily intimidated by her ability to work and that she was the breadwinner. He was emasculated by her beauty and her power, and his temper could erupt. He was never physically abusive towards her,” a source tells the publication. “He was very possessive in a very kind of caveman way but was never abusive to her or the family… He had an explosive temper in a way that was profoundly frightening. You never knew when he would explode.”

The same insider adds that Martinez has “definite anger management issues,” as shown during his many altercations with the paparazzi or that time he beat Aubry to a bloody pulp during a custody exchange that, at the time, didn’t even concern him.

Olivier Martinez is afraid

While Berry controls the story through the media, celebrity pundits believe that Martinez is gearing up for the fight that he knows will come.

He and the Oscar-winner have an iron-clad prenup, so there’s no chance he will get a share of her money in the divorce. They also have a son together, Maceo, and if the previous custody fight (for Nahla, the daughter Berry has with Aubry) is any indication, Halle will want to limit his time with the child as much as possible.

One way to do that is by discrediting him in the press by leaking stories like the one above, about his temper and his violent tendencies, to show that he’s not a fit parent.

Berry has played this game before with Aubry and it cost him many jobs and money. Rumor has it that Martinez is afraid the same will happen to him.

Johnny Depp and Amber Heard will be featured on one of the final four episodes of Overhaulin’ on Velocity, and teasers released so far promise quite an exciting show. After all, it’s not every day that you get to see an A-lister help pull off a hilarious prank of his wife.

The episode will focus on Amber’s classic Mustang, which has fallen into disrepair and has even been stolen a couple of times. Depp and his father-in-law join forces to prank Amber before she gets it refurbished, tricking her into thinking the police officers she called to investigate the car’s disappearance are more focused on selfies than on actually solving the case.

The video below shows Amber growing increasingly frustrated with the cops, flipping them and refusing to believe that they would ask for selfies when they’re in an official capacity.

It also shows the moment she finds out the whole thing had been a prank, put together by her husband and her father.

Too Fab has another video from the episode at the link, with Amber’s reaction when she gets back the car in mint condition. Her reaction isn’t the kind you’d expect from a celebrity of her caliber, as she actually breaks down in tears of joy when she sees the beauty in front of her.

“I bought it as kind of a drivable piece of junk,” she says at one point. “The car cost me every dime I had.” Which would explain her emotional reaction to the upgrade: that Mustang is more than a car to her.